In light of current controversy about CIA briefing practices, I was surprised to learn that the agency erroneously listed an appropriations staffer as being in a key briefing on September 19, 2006, when in fact he was not. The list the agency released entitled "Member Briefings on Enhanced Interrogation Techniques (EITs)", shows that House Appropriations Committee defense appropriations staffer Paul Juola was in that briefing on that date. In fact, Mr. Juola recollects that he walked members to the briefing room, met General Hayden and Mr.Walker, who were the briefers, and was told that he could not attend the briefing. We request that you immediately correct this record.
Sincerely,
David R. Obey

Is this the aide that supposedly attended a top secret briefing and was told about waterboarding? I don't know, but I do wonder...why, oh why, would a Congressional aide attend top secret CIA briefings?

So, while Pelosi has NOW decided to shut her mouth (a bit like shutting the barn door after the animals are out roaming), it's interesting that there are conflicting "recollections" of past events, though not at all unusual.

Conflicting recollections
The differing interpretations of the briefing memos mirror the conflicting recollections of Pelosi and three other congressional leaders about what they were told roughly a year after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

Porter J. Goss (R-Fla.), the former representative who chaired the intelligence panel in 2002, has suggested that he and Pelosi left their briefing understanding "what the CIA was doing" and offering their support, while Pelosi said waterboarding and other aggressive techniques were mentioned only as legal tactics for future interrogations.

Even more deeply divergent are the recollections of Bob Graham (D-Fla.), the former senator who chaired the Senate intelligence committee in 2002, and Sen. Richard C. Shelby (Ala.), the panel's ranking Republican. In interviews this week, Graham said waterboarding was never mentioned by CIA briefers in their meeting. But Shelby said that he and Graham were specifically told that the technique had already yielded valuable information.

The CIA participated in more than 2,100 congressional briefings and meetings during the 110th Congress an average of more than 20 sessions a week. But the agency declined to discuss details of specific briefings, and a spokesman yesterday again dismissed suggestions that the agency gave lawmakers a misleading portrait of the interrogations.

"The CIA takes seriously its responsibility to provide information to the United States Congress," said the spokesman, George Little.

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